Arsenal:
             Almunia
Hoyte Toure Senderos Traore (Eboue 65)
Walcott Diaby (Hleb 69) Cesc Denilson
   Baptista Aliadiere (Adebayor 80)

From the start, we attacked and rattled them. A midfield featuring just one first-team regular, and a 19 year old at that, dominated one featuring Lampard, Makalele, Ballack, and Essien. OK, so ours included that 19 year old, Cesc Fabregas, who has become better than any of their 4, but in fact he had a relatively poor game. Abou Diaby was massive though, like a more attacking version of Patrick Vieira, and if any one thing turned the game their way in the second half it was the steel we lost when he had to go off injured. That and the introduction of Arjen Robben.

For the first 20 minutes, Chelsea hardly got a touch. On 5, Walcott tried a one-two with Diaby (a sign of things to come) but a defender got to the ball to clear it. It fell to Fabregas who forced a save (not a hard one) from Cech.

Julio Baptista scuffed a shot after being put through by Denilson, and it nearly turned into a decent cross for Jeremie Aliadiere, and then Baptista made better contact with a shot that Cech had to tip round the post.

We took the lead in that opening spell of pressure, thanks to a superbly crafted and finished first goal for the club from Theo Walcott after 12 minutes. Our corner had been cleared but Theo retrieved the ball on the left, halfway between the box and the halfway line. He passed forward and central to Diaby just outside the D and made for the box himself. Diaby controlled the ball, kept hold of it under pressure with a couple of touches and then, with the ball under his feet a bit, clipped a pass toward Walcott whose run had taken him level with the defensive line on the edge of the box. His first touch took him through that line and his second curled the ball beautifully past Petr Cech and high inside the right post for 1-0.

Soon after, Baptista went down in the box under challenge from Diarra but the ref waved play on. We kept up the pressure but then on 20 minutes Chelsea finally had an attack. After Philippe Senderos had blocked Lampard's shot the ball came to Ballack on their left. His diagonal ball to the far side found Drogba in loads of space. Some say he looked offside but Senderos in the middle had one of his legs positioned behind his body, and playing Drogba on. The striker collected the ball and slotted it underneath the advancing Manuel Almunia for 1-1.

Chelsea pressed for a second but we stood firm. Then a magnificent ball from Denilson found Aliadiere but he tried to go it alone instead of looking for support - Baptista and Diaby had found positions in the box, and Carvalho got over to tackle the young Frenchman.

Arsenal started the second half strongly. Baptista' pass inside the full back put Diaby clear and Cech made a brilliant save. Soon after, Cesc's low shot had Cech beaten but went inches beyond the far post.

The came the moment that probably changed the game. John Terry stooped to try to head a loose ball in our box as Diaby went to kick it clear. It looked like Diaby's boot caught the England skipper under the chin, and instantly he went down the players (Cesc seemed to be on the ball quickest) were calling for assistance. Arsenal physio Gary Lewinm who'd been treating an Arsenal players just beforehand and hadn't made his way all the way back to the dugout yet, was first on the scene and was able to check that the unconscious Terry's airways were clear. After a break of 6 minutes, he was stretchered off and the game continued. Jon Obi Mikel came on, with Essien dropping back into defence. As things turned out, though, Diaby had picked up a foot injury and although he tried to play on it was with less effect, and with 20 minutes to go he was replaced by Alexander Hleb. Now Hleb's a fine player, but a very different kind of player, and the loss of Diaby's strength in midfield gave Chelsea the chance to dominate it. They'd lost Terry too, of course. But Terry, who 24 hours earlier had been a cert to miss the game through injury, had unsurprisingly not been having his greatest game.

The incident seemed to shake the Arsenal players (Almunia, for example, said later that he'd thought Terry might be dead), whereas perhaps it galvanised Chelsea.

The other thing which had changed things was the introduction of Robben from the subs bench at half time. Armand Traore had been having a good game in the first half, defending well despite Chelsea clearly (and understandably, he's no Gael Clichy) having targeted his wing, and getting forward from time to time as well. But they put Robben on Traore's side of the pitch and Robben had the better of him. Before long (but not before Drogba had forced a save from Almunia), Wenger brought Traore off, switched Justin Hoyte from right back to the left, and brought on Emmanuel Eboue. Eboue had not been expected to make the game, having only just returned to training from his injury on Friday. Robben stopped focussing on the right wing and with him occupying Eboue's side of the pitch we had the hilarious sight of Eboue complaining about Robben's diving. Eboue's spell of absence does not appear to have sorted his head out at all. He's a better player than Hoyte but there's a whole load of Arsenal fans these days thinking the latter deserves a place more. Someone please have a word with Eboue.

Chelsea clearly had the upper hand now, thanks to the weakening of our midfield since the loss of Diaby, the visible tiring of Aliadiere and Walcott reducing our chances of worrying them on the break, and Robben pulling the strings from either wing. With just less than 20 minutes to go (or 30, including the masses of added time) a superb shot from Lampard crashed off the crossbar. We nearly snuck a winner against the run of play when a rare decent corner from Arsenal (Cesc I think) found Kolo Toure's head in space in the box, but he couldn't direct the free header on goal.

With 10 minutes left Emmanuel Adebayor came on for Aliadiere who'd had a great game (but had run out of legs). Almost straight away, Robben swung a cross from their left, and Drogba muscled his way in front of Senderos to place a fantastic glancing header past Almunia and in off the far post.

Shevchenko nearly made it 3-1 moments later when it was his turn to hit the bar. Then, as the 7 minutes of injury time started, came the incident that everyone is, sadly, talking about. It started with Mikel's foul on Toure, continued with the pair of them in a bit of pushing and shoving, then everyone else got involved quite unnecessarily and 3 players ended up sent off. Mikel, Toure, and Adebayor. I'll write more on this later, but whatever Arsenal fans might like to think, none of the 3 can complain. If there's anything to wonder at it's why certain players were picked out for further punishment and not others. Lampard and Cesc looked as bad offenders as anyone.

At the end of the day though, it was all a bit of a fuss about nothing.

Chelsea left the stadium as winners, and deservedly so after they'd turned the game around so comprehensively in the second half, but I think Arsenal fans left feeling like winners too. Our young players proved that the wins of this season, over Liverpool and Tottenham in particular but also that FA Cup replay at Bolton, were no flukes. We really do have some very exciting young players and once they've added a little strength, endurance, and experience, they'll be up to facing anyone.

Some people have asked me since the game, how can I not be disappointed at this loss? So we saw some promising young players, but at the end of the day they lost the final. That can't be good, surely?

Well, I was there at Highbury in 1998 when the policy of playing the youngsters in this competition started. When we played Vialli's Chelsea in the 4th round with a team featuring Nelson Vivas, David Grondin, Alberto Mendez, Remi Garde, Chris Wreh, Stephen Hughes and Fabian Caballero. We lost 5-0 and after the game Arsene Wenger told us that this is the sort of thing you have to expect if you field a second-string side.

I wonder if he remembers saying that, and how he feels about it now. Perhaps the answer is that, after 9 years of working on the squad, there's no longer such a thing as a second string Arsenal side.